Mayara Tavares: The debate over the 'Obama looking at girl' photo

Scrutinizing a snapshot of a Brazilian girl and two presidents at the G8

obama girl photo
(Image credit: Maurizio Bambatti/EPA/Corbis)

"I'm a little disappointed that our president is a bit of a pig," said Michele McGinty in BeliefNet. The photo currently making the rounds on the Internet and on TV clearly shows President Obama checking out a girl—Mayara Tavares, 16, of Brazil—at the G8 conference. After close scrutiny of the "Obama looking at a girl" photo, the only thing that can be said in the president's defense is that he wasn't leering as badly as French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

The "Obama looking at girl" photo certainly looks bad, said Lynn Sweet in the Chicago Sun-Times. But if you look at ABC News' video, you can see what President Obama was really doing as Mayara Tavares—who was identified by some news outlets as Mayora Tavares—walked by. "Conclusion: Obama was not looking; Sarkozy maybe."

The video does appear to absolve the American president in "O-bum-a-gate," said Germany's Bild.com. The real cad caught in the "Obama looking at girl" photo is Nicolas Sarkozy. The video shows President Obama looking down not at the behind of Mayara Tavares, or Mayora Tavares, but at the hand of another young delegate he is helping down a step where the youth delegates posed with leaders for a group photo. Obama wasn't checking out a girl, but the video doesn't look good for the leering Sarkozy.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Continue reading for free

We hope you're enjoying The Week's refreshingly open-minded journalism.

Subscribed to The Week? Register your account with the same email as your subscription.